Federal Vision
Flagged as a concern
A movement within Reformed churches that ties a person's standing with God closely to baptism and ongoing covenant faithfulness, blurring justification by faith alone.
Also called: Auburn Avenue theology, covenant faithfulness
What it means
Federal Vision arose in the early 2000s among some Reformed and Presbyterian pastors. It stresses the objectivity of the covenant: every baptized person is united to Christ and receives His benefits in some real sense. Those who later fall away are said to have truly been in Christ, covenantally, and then lost those blessings. Many of its writers also reject or reshape the covenant of works and the imputation of Christ's active obedience, and speak of final justification as tied to persevering covenant faithfulness.
Its holders see themselves as recovering a strong, church-centered view of the sacraments and a healthy concern for faithfulness. They usually affirm justification by faith and would deny teaching salvation by works.
Several conservative Presbyterian denominations studied the movement and concluded that its key teachings are contrary to the Westminster Standards, particularly on justification, election, perseverance, and the effect of baptism. This site flags it as a concern.
What Scripture says
Having begun by the Spirit, we are not perfected by the flesh.
If it is by grace, it is no longer by works; otherwise grace would not be grace.
God saved us not by works of righteousness we had done, but by His mercy.
Those who went out from us were never truly of us.
Those God justifies, He also glorifies; none are lost along the way.
What is wrong with it
Scripture teaches that those who are truly justified are glorified, and that those who fall away were never truly of Christ's people. Federal Vision's claim that baptized people can be united to Christ and then lose that union cuts against this. Tying final acceptance to covenant faithfulness makes the believer's own obedience part of what secures his standing, which Paul says turns grace into something other than grace.
How it undermines the truth
It undermines justification by faith alone, by making the verdict at the last day depend in part on the believer's faithfulness. It undermines the perseverance of the saints and the certainty of election, since union with Christ can be lost. And it overstates what baptism accomplishes, inviting people to rest on their baptism rather than on Christ received by faith.
How it can harm a church
Members can be lulled into presuming on their baptism and church membership, or troubled about whether their covenant faithfulness will be enough at the end. The movement has divided congregations and presbyteries. A church influenced by it may sound fully Reformed in its vocabulary while teaching something different on how a sinner stands before God.
This page describes a teaching, not the faith of any person who holds it.
Where it comes up
Confessions: WCF 11.1; WCF 17.1; WCF 28.5-6; WCF 7.2
On this site: Gospel & justification
Related terms
Justification by faith aloneHistoric orthodoxy
God declares sinners righteous in His sight not because of anything they do, but only because of Christ's righteousness, received through faith alone.
ImputationHistoric orthodoxy
God counts, or credits, one person's standing to another, so that our sin was counted to Christ and His righteousness is counted to those who believe.
New Perspective on PaulFlagged as a concern
A school of New Testament study that reads Paul's teaching on justification mainly as about who belongs to God's people, often denying that Christ's righteousness is imputed to believers.